The Games of the Year, as Decided by Cold Hard Numbers

Now that the end of the year is here, everyone is starting to declare their "game of the year". Well, heavyweight game-score aggregator Metacritic has now thrown its hat into the ring.

Or, more accurately, 'everyone's' collective hat. Metacritic pools the scores of many different gaming publications, after all. And according to those pooled scores, the top game of 2014 is....Smash Bros. Well, technically. This is the actual list:

But taking off the games that are remakes or remasters — which is what GTA and TLOU are — Smash is the top game of the year, at least when it comes to many review scores. According to the Metacritic numbers, while Smash was the winner, it scored way lower than the top games in previous years.

In 2013, GTA V won with a 97. In 2012, The Walking Dead came out on top with a 95. And in 2011, Batman: Arkham City won the gold with a 96. Smash Bros., by contrast, has a collective 92. Still great, but also in the lower end of the 90-100 bracket.

Based on platform, the numbers look a little different. The PS4 had the most top-rated games this year, followed by the Xbox One, followed by the Wii U: